Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry. 1904.

Poems of Friendship

To Seek a Friend

William Cowper (1731–1800)

WHAT virtue, or what mental grace,

But men unqualified and base

Will boast it their possession?

Profusion apes the noble part

Of liberality of heart,

And dulness, of discretion.

If every polished gem we find

Illuminating heart or mind,

Provoke to imitation;

No wonder friendship does the same,

That jewel of the purest flame,

Or rather constellation.

No friendship will abide the test,

That stands on sordid interest,

Or mean self-love erected;

Nor such as may awhile subsist,

Between the sot and sensualist,

For vicious ends connected.

Who seek a friend should come disposed,

T’ exhibit in full bloom disclosed

The graces and the beauties,

That form the character he seeks,

For ’t is a union that bespeaks

Reciprocated duties.

But will sincerity suffice?

It is indeed above all price,

And must be made the basis;

But ev’ry virtue of the soul

Must constitute the charming whole,

All shining in their places.

A fretful temper will divide

The closest knot that may be tied,

By ceaseless sharp corrosion;

A temper passionate and fierce

May suddenly your joys disperse

At one immense explosion.

In vain the talkative unite

In hopes of permanent delight—

The secret just committed,

Forgetting its important weight,

They drop through mere desire to prate,

And by themselves outwitted.

How bright soe’er the prospect seems,

All thoughts of friendship are but dreams

If envy chance to creep in;

An envious man, if you succeed,

May prove a dang’rous foe indeed,

But not a friend worth keeping.

The great and small but rarely meet

On terms of amity complete;

Plebeians must surrender,

And yield so much to noble folk,

It is combining fire with smoke,

Obscurity with splendor.

Courtier and patriot cannot mix

Their het’rogeneous politics

Without an effervescence,

Like that of salts with lemon-juice,

Which does not yet like that produce

A friendly coalescence.

Religion should extinguish strife,

And make a calm of human life;

But friends that chance to differ

On points which God has left at large,

How freely will they meet and charge!

No combatants are stiffer.

To prove at last my main intent

Needs no expense of argument,

No cutting and contriving—

Seeking a real friend, we seem

T’ adopt the chymists’ golden dream,

With still less hope of thriving.

Sometimes the fault is all our own,

Some blemish in due time made known,

By trespass or omission;

Sometimes occasion brings to light

Our friend’s defect long hid from sight,

And even from suspicion.

Then judge yourself and prove your man

As circumspectly as you can,

And, having made election,

Beware no negligence of yours,

Such as a friend but ill endures,

Enfeeble his affection.

As similarity of mind,

Or something not to be defined

First fixes our attention;

So manners decent and polite,

The same we practised at first sight,

Must save it from declension.

Pursue the search, and you will find

Good sense and knowledge of mankind

To be at least expedient,

And, after summoning all the rest,

Religion ruling in the breast

A principal ingredient.